Our weekend of wild North Texas living

Listen, if you've been to a 90th birthday party lately I don't need to tell you how cuh-raaaazy they can get. I'll just leave the specifics of the throwdown to your imagination. I will say that Anna learned that party = free food and beverage.

Components of the infamous Red Drank.

I will also say that my mother made some caloric monstrosities called "cookie balls," designed for people who think, "This Oreo is okay but it would be better if I mushed it up with some cream cheese and then dipped it in chocolate." (Note: this type of thinking should really be left to professionals such as beloved television personality Paula Deen. It just seems dangerous in the general population.) I did not take any pictures of them at the party. Nor will I take a picture of the bag of them currently sitting in my refrigerator, because if I do I will eat another one and I feel that more than four in one day is unseemly.

Post-party dinner was a pile of bits from various trays and two cans of beer.

This is actually a dramatic reenactment.

Sunday's proper meal was actually lunch: grilled squash, tomato salad, and tilapia. Very tasty. Thanks, Mom! But if you could include a souffle next time, that'd be great.

The reason this meal looks very well balanced and seasonally appropriate is that I didn't make it.

Anyway, a fine time all around, and now we're back in Austin for the week o'birthdays. With Anna's big number one coming up, I've started to wonder if I should be paying more attention to milestones and such. Getting food from a bowl to a mouth, for example. When she was a fetus, I was pretty much keeping track of her development on a second by second basis, and now when someone says their seven month old is calling them Mama and Dada, I have to just fake an "oh, yeah, obviously" face while I secretly wonder if my child is challenged. I dunno, it's a lot easier to keep track of this kind of stuff when you don't have kids.

Um...should one year olds be able to do...things?